By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton has been slapped with a five-place grid penalty by Formula 1 stewards for breaching the yellow flags rules during the Dutch Grand Prix on Sunday.
Hamilton, who crashed out of the Dutch Grand Prix through his own driver error, will start no higher than sixth for Ferrari’s home event at Monza and has been given two penalty points on his superlicence.
His infringement came on the laps to the grid around 40 minutes before the formation lap, where double yellow flags at the last corner were being waved.
Hamilton was only 20kph (12.4mph) slower than the speed he was doing in practice, which was deemed not significant enough.
The stewards also noted separately that Hamilton did not enter the pit lane at “greatly reduced speed”, lifting and braking only 70 metres earlier compared to practice.
It only adds to the misery for Hamilton after he lost control of his car at Turn 3 when running in seventh during the race and suffered his first retirement as a Ferrari driver.
It meant he was found to have breached Appendix H, Article 2.5.5 b) of the International Sporting Code and noncompliance with the race director’s event notes and breach of Article 44.1 of the F1 sporting regulations.
“Due to the nature of the track, the Race Director had informed all participants that the last corner before the pit lane would have double yellow flags waved,” the stewards’ verdict read.
“This was to ensure the safety of those on the grid and in the pit lane. The regulations require that any driver passing through a double waved yellow flag marshalling sector ‘reduce speed significantly…’. We looked through the available telemetry within the FIA system. We also requested the team to provide us with their telemetry data. All of this took some time and this decision was delayed as a result.
“In addition, Article 44.1 requires all drivers covering more than one reconnaissance lap to drive down the pit entry road at ‘greatly reduced speed’. The data showed that the driver had entered the double yellow sector approximately 20kph less than his speed at the same point in practice sessions, had reduced throttle application in the order of 10% to 20% and had lifted and braked 70 metres earlier when entering the pit lane.
Hamilton said he was not sure what had happened and apologised to his team.
“As I went up the bank, the rear snapped out and I couldn’t recover,” he told Sky Sports. “It was a bit twitchy, the car.
“I think we made real progress this weekend. My pace was looking pretty decent. I was catching (Mercedes’) George (Russell) and I think I had the pace of a few cars ahead of me.”
The retirement – in the first race after the sport’s summer break – extended Hamilton’s streak of 15 races without a grand prix podium since joining Ferrari at the start of this season.